Laal Singh Chaddha: Aamir Khan reveals why his character is a Sikh in the Forrest Gump adaptation

Aamir Khan's upcoming film Laal Singh Chaddha is an official remake of the 1994 Hollywood classic Forrest Gump starring Tom Hanks in the titular role. The Robert Zemeckis directorial shows how Forrest unintentionally impact several historical events in the 20th century-United States. 

In a recent interview, Aamir Khan revealed the reason behind the protagonist in Laal Singh Chaddha, directed by Advait Chandan, being a Sikh sharing that his Rang De Basanti co-star Atul Kulkarni, who has done the Indian adaptation, had kept the lead character as a Sikh in his script.

Talking to Galatta Plus, the Taare Zameen Par actor-director said, "Atul in his adaptation had already placed him as a Sikh and all of that was already in place. When we received it as a script, we were already reading it a Sikh character, you know he was part of that script and it felt very natural to us so none of us questioned why is he a Sikh."

Aamir continued, "It was very organic to us because technically he could be anyone...he could be a South Indian, it could be any character. But now that I think about it, Atul did that because in our timeline of recent socio-political history in '83-84, that was a very difficult time and the Sikh community went through a lot of difficulties at that time."

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"So by making your lead character a Sikh, what Atul was trying to do and he did that, I think rather well, is that you're investing your emotions very strongly in the character, in the incident, from where the film goes on...I think that's why he made it a Sikh", the actor concluded.

Apart from Aamir playing the titular character, the emotional drama features Kareena Kapoor Khan, Mona Singh, and Naga Chaitanya in the lead roles. Laal Singh Chaddha releases in cinemas on August 11 and will clash with Akshay Kumar's Raksha Bandhan.